“Get out of my way.”
His fingers dug into my arm, the pressure biting against bone. I twisted, but his grip only tightened. Something in his face—blank and manic—froze me for half a beat. Then a sound ripped down the hallway, low and guttural.
Shoes struck concrete.
Calder filled the doorway, shadow swallowing the pale rink light behind him. Shoulders squared, eyes locked on Nate.
“Let her fucking go,” he growled, voice low and steady enough to vibrate in my ribs. He took another step forward. “Or I’ll break every bone in your body.”
Nate’s hand twitched. For a second, I thought he might listen. Then something in his pride snapped. He shoved me away, hard enough that my spine hit cold glass. The air left my lungs in one short gasp.
And he lunged.
Calder met him halfway. The collision sounded like a car crash—flesh and anger and years of poison detonating in the same breath.
Nate swung first, wild and fast. Calder ducked it, answering with a fist to the ribs that cracked against bone. Nate staggered but didn’t drop. He came back snarling, head down, driving into his father’s chest with the same reckless power he used on the ice. They crashed against the boards, the echo rolling through the empty rink like thunder.
I tried to speak, to move, but my body wouldn’t cooperate. My heart rattled against my ribs. They didn’t even look human anymore—just motion, raw and animal.
Nate caught Calder across the jaw. Blood shone at the corner of his mouth; he wiped it away with the back of his hand and smiled, a sharp and humorless thing.
“That all you got?” Calder snarled.
Nate spat, breathless, eyes wild. “You took everything from me—my shot, my image, her! You couldn’t stand that I made it.”
Calder slammed him back against the glass. The pane shivered. “You made it because I bled for it, you ungrateful little?—”
Nate drove his knee up hard. The older man doubled slightly but didn’t fall. He grabbed Nate by the collar, twisted, and threw him flat onto the ice-side mat. The thud echoed. Calder didn’tpause; he followed, fists hammering. Old rage, fresh betrayal. Father versus son. Alpha versus brat.
“Calder!” I yelled this time. My voice cracked.
He landed another punch—this one clean across Nate’s cheek—and Nate’s head snapped to the side. Blood spattered, bright against the rubber floor.
“Enough!” I shoved forward, palm catching Calder’s shoulder. He barely blinked at me, chest heaving, eyes locked on the man beneath him. For a heartbeat, I thought he might actually kill him.
Nate’s breaths came ragged, but the smirk still hovered, bloody and smug. “Go ahead,” he rasped, teeth pink. “Finish it. Then watch them drag your ass out of here in cuffs.”
Calder froze. The sound of that smirk filled the silence around us.
He let go.
Nate rolled onto one elbow, wiped his mouth, and grinned wider even as blood ran down his chin. “Still the same,” he said. “Still a coward when it counts.”
The hit came faster than thought. One sharp arc of Calder’s arm, one impact that cracked through the air and dropped Nate like a cut puppet. He hit the mat with a dull, final sound.
For a long moment, no one moved.
Calder stood over him, panting, knuckles split, chest rising and falling like surf after a storm. The veins stood out in his neck; his entire body shook with the aftermath. He looked at me then, just once, and something soft flickered under all that rage.
I swallowed hard. My arm ached where Nate’s fingers had left their bruise.
Nate groaned, pushing himself up to one knee. Blood streaked his face; his eyes burned, smaller now, confused and furious.
“This isn’t over.” He pointed at his father, hand trembling. “You hear me? You think she saves you? You’re both done.”
He staggered past us, shoulders caved in, steps uneven. Out the door, down the hall, gone.
The sound of the exit slamming echoed through the arena like a final whistle.
